Nationalism, not populism, is the real threat to democracy

Populism is perhaps the most overrated concept today. The assumption that populism is threatening to destabilise democratic regimes in Europe abound in both the media and the academy. Populism, as Kas Mudde has argued, is not anti-democratic, but against liberal democracy. It supports the ideal of a majority or popular democracy based on the general will of people. However, this potential threat to liberal democracies is purely hypothetical.

There is a current wave of populism in Europe and there is pressure on liberal freedoms in many European countries, but is populism a significant cause of these current pressures on liberal democracies? To identify threats (or correctives are dying) against liberal democracies it is important to be assessed instead of allegedly the impact of populism. Research shows that populist parties have had little impact on institutional democratic reforms in Western Europe so far. With electoral systems in the overwhelming proportional majority and coalition governments where populist parties are mostly small partners, the considerable opposition to trials, parliaments and civil societies, in total liberal democracies in Western Europe provide sustainable contexts.

However, this still leaves open the possibility that populism has been a major force in establishing liberal regimes in Hungary, Poland, or Latin America and that it can grow and become such a force in Western Europe. My arguments to investigate the potential impact of populism on liberal democracies are more general.

First, populism is not an essential ideology of parties or political movements in Europe. Neither the populist parties, nor their voters, tend to give much weight to the issues of democratic reform. The dissatisfaction with politics is a side reason for voters in Western Europe to vote radical right-wing parties and play no role in motivating them to electorally support the left-wing populist parties. Just like their voters, the populist parties do not attach much importance to the issues of democratic reform. For example, for radical right-wing populist parties proposals for introducing direct forms of democracy or reforming the judiciary tend to be instrumental for antimigration policies and security issues. Nationalism and authoritarianism are far more important ideological sources for these parties than populism. For the left-wing populist parties, it still remains to be seen whether or not they aim to reform liberal democracies into popular democracies.

Second, not all populist Fridays are against liberal democracy. Some parties are simply rhetorical populist. For example, the Dutch Socialist Party (SP) is widely considered a populist party. Of course, the party often opposed good people with corrupt elites like bankers, but the SP is also committed to a liberal democracy. This is in contrast with the radical right-wing Party for Freedom (PVV) of Geert Wilders, which is not only rhetorically populist, but also shows little devotion to liberal democracy.

Third, pressure on liberal democracies is not limited to populist parties. Political proposals and legislative initiatives that are tense with or ignoring fundamental freedoms also come from the main party. Comparative systematic research is still missing, but one carried out in the Netherlands makes it clear that policies that are in conflict with rule of law are not limited to populist parties.

The systematic comparison of election posters demonstrates that the main right parties also increasingly tend to support policies that submit fundamental rights to the political objectives, such as restricting immigration and improving security. In other words, the joint drivers of both populist parties and non-populist parties to seek the limits of rule of law or to go beyond them are immigration and security threats. If there is any ideology threatening liberal democracies today, nationalism and authoritarianism are much more candidates than populism.